Voters unhappy with their city councilman’s move out of the district he was elected to represent will not find recourse with Richmond’s general registrar.
Spurning a request by three 5th District residents seeking the removal of City Councilman Parker Agelasto, Registrar J. Kirk Showalter sent a letter to the petitioners late last week declining to hold a hearing to review his voter registration status.
“I am not empowered to conduct any hearings or to cancel Mr. Agelasto’s registration ... and cannot provide you with the relief that you seek,” Showalter wrote in the letter, dated Thursday, to the former chairman of the Virginia Board of Elections, Michael G. Brown; former 5th District Councilman Chuck Richardson; and former senior assistant city attorney Beverly Burton.
She cited a clause in state law that forbids registrars from reviewing a voter’s registration on the grounds of “removal of residence.”
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Showalter said she consulted with the City Attorney’s Office before responding and referred questions about who could hear residents’ concerns back to that office. The same petitioners have asked the City Council to unseat Agelasto.
Agelasto cited family reasons in an announcement last month that he would not seek a third term on the city’s nine-member governing body, where he has represented the communities of Randolph, Oregon Hill, Woodland Heights, Swansboro, Byrd Park, Carytown and part of the Fan since 2013.
In June, Agelasto bought a new house on West Franklin Street in the 1st District, which is represented by Councilman Andreas Addison.
In an interview last month, Agelasto said his family needed more space. His wife is pregnant with the couple’s second child.
While his family has been living in the new house for months, Agelasto has not sold his Floyd Avenue home in the 5th District and said he intends to move back there. He would not say when.
After Brown, Richardson and Burton filed the complaint late last month, Agelasto said he had no plans to resign and had received encouragement from some of his constituents.
Reached by phone Monday, Agelasto said he had not seen Showalter’s letter. Asked whether he has plans to resign, he said he does not, but does plan to “continue to serve [5th District residents] as I have for the last six years.”
“I was duly elected, properly elected to represent the 5th District and I continue to serve in that capacity and fulfill my responsibilities as the representative of the district and continue to attend the civic meetings and dialogue with residents and see them at the grocery store and everywhere else and will continue to best serve them as I have for the last six years so, um, I think that pretty much sums up what I’ve been saying for however long this has been going on.”
Brown said in an email that he disagreed with Showalter’s decision.
“We will continue to pursue remedies allowed by law,” he said.
Separately, Brown, Richardson and Burton sent a letter to council members Wednesday requesting they invoke a city charter provision to remove Agelasto. The charter clause stipulates the council can pursue removal on the grounds of “malfeasance in office or neglect of duty.”
“We the undersigned, residents and qualified voters of the Fifth District, urgently and respectfully request Council to act without delay,” the residents’ letter states. In it, they also object to Agelasto drawing his council salary and question whether the votes he has cast since moving from the 5th District should count.
Council President Chris Hilbert, who is seeking a legal opinion from the City Attorney’s Office on the situation, on Monday did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment on the situation.